FIRE PREVENTION.

Press, Volume LIX, Issue 17812, 11 July 1923, Page 7

FIRE PREVENTION.

ANNUAL STATISTICS. Superintendent Warner presented to the Christehurch Fire Board last night a report covering the statistics for the past year ending June 30th. The superintendent said that during the year the Brigade received 230 calls, a decrease of 38 when compared with the previous year. Of these, 64 were false alarms (43 being of a malicious nature), 48 were chimney fires, 9 were rubbish, gorse, and hedge fires, 12 were outside district calls, and 97 were for actual fires in the city area. Of the latter, 55 were classified, as resulting in trifling damage, 12 in sUght damage, 22 in considerable damage, and 8 in total destruction. The fire losses were £44,485. Calls received from police and strangers numbered 134 by automatic alarms, 86 by telephone exchange, and 127 through the Board's street fire alarm system. City fires were extinguished on 28 occasions by inmates with buckets of water and garden hoses, 20 were extinguished by chemicals, 41 with one delivery of water from the city supply, 7 with two deliveries, and 1 with three deliveries. The quantity of water used at fires was approximately 581,000 gallons from the high pressure water supply, and 8800 gallons from the river and creeks. The largest number of calls were received between 6 p.m. and midnight, viz., 108, or nearly half the total number of calls for the year. Forty-two calls were received on Saturdays, 37 on Sundays, 38 on Mondays, 26 oil Tuesdays, 26 on Wednesdays, 27 on Thursdays, and 34 on Fridays; 17 were received during the month of July last, 29 in August, 24 in September, 26 in October, 20 in November, 22 in December, 12 in January, 9 in February, 16 in March, 15 in April, 23 in May, and 17 in June. The causes of fires were attributed to beeswax boiling over, faulty construction of bakers' ovens, clothing in contact with fire, candles in contact with curtains, defective chimneys, defective copper grates in washhouses, fusing of electrical wires, electric flettles, floor polish boiling over, defective gas fittings, explosion of , gas, gas rings left burning, hot ashes, hot iro« left on table, ignition of fat in ovens, ignition of petrol vapour, incendiarism, suspected incendiarism, explosion of kerosene lamps, unslaked lime, motorcars back-firing, matches, sparks from adjoining chimneys, shellac boiling over, smoking, overheating or steriliser, spontaneous combustion, tar boiling over, and 17 from unknown causes. The following was a summary of the risks and trades where fires occurred in the city:—Bakehouses, billiard saloon, builders' workshops, billiard table manufacturers, boot factory, bird dealer, boardiughouses, chemical factory, confectioners' factory, chemist shop, Catholic Convent, furniture factory, furniture store, floor polish manufacturers, fowlhouses, fruiterer's shop, general engineers, grain and produce merchants, greenhouses, hotels, hospitals, motor-ears and cycles, newspaper offices, photographic workshop, private dwellings (occupied and unoccupied), Sports Club rooms, sheds, soap and candle factory, stables,, saw expert saleyards, tea kiosk, tar, timber in section, tea rooms, tailor's workroom, workmen's whare, washhouses, and general warehouses. Four calls were attended in Biccarton, three at Cashmere, one at Addington, and the Brigade also turned out to Burwood, Hillsborough, and Fendalton, but in the absence of no previous arrangements with the Board, the motors did &ot proceed beyond the city boundaries.